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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



Helps and 

HiNDERANCES 

EMILY HUNTINGTON MILLER 



fSi \\ » \ -ix IS. 

HUNT .1- FATOX 



HELPS AND HINDERANCES 



BY 



/ 



EMILY HUNTINGTON MILLER 



^1 



*' I will do my best to do the best." — Arthur Warwick, 1637 



NEIF YORK: HUNT df> EA TON" y /^ V^ ^ ^^ 

CI NCI NN A TI: CRANSTON <5r» STOWE ' 

1892 ^'^^ 







The LiBRARir 
OF Congress 




WASHINGTON 




Copyright, 1892. by 

HUNT & EATON 

New York. 


' 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Weights or Wings ? 5 



The Amusement Question 12 

Leading in Prayer 32 

Speaking to Edification 41 

Growth in Grace 48 



fiELP^ AND JilJMDERANCE^. 



WEIGHTS OR WINGS? 




OW truly Paul read human 
nature when he penned that 
injunction to those who 
would run with patience the race 
set before them, " laying aside every 
weight, and the sin which doth so 
easily beset us ! " The first warning 
is against the weights. Sin besets 
us as a declared enemy, and when he 
shows his face we turn away from 
him ; we put him behind our backs ; 
we wage open warfare with him ; we 
feel that it is a question of conquest 
or defeat. But the weights — there 




6 Helps and Hinderances. 

are so many of them, and we find 
that we can run, after a fashion, in 
spite of them. Some of them are 
even pleasant things to take along, 
and we are slow to believe they really 
hinder our progress. We see others 
for whom we have great respect car- 
rying them also, and so we go on, sat- 
isfied that our faces are set in the 
right direction, and scarcely conscious 
how much of the strength with which 
we press toward the mark is expended 
in simply carrying along these weights 
with which we have burdened our- 
selves. 

"If I really thought it was wrong," 
says the young Christian; "but I can- 
not see that it harms me at all." As 
if absolute right and wrong or person- 
al damage were the highest tests to 
which any course of action could be 
brought. The Bible sets up for us a 
far higher standard when it condemns 



Weights or Wings? 7 

things that are lawful simply because 
they are not expedient, because they 
do not edify ; things that are harmless 
because they are hinderances to others. 
If I send a messenger on my errands 
he has no right so to load himself 
down that he can only creep where I 
have bidden him haste, neither has a 
man on the kings highway a right to 
carry a load that, projecting right and 
left, keeps every one else back. Sit 
down and consider your equipment. 
We sometimes sing : 

" Our souls, how heavily they go 
To reach immortal joys." 

But it may be they cannot use their 
wings because of unnecessary weights 
which we have fastened upon them. 
Can you say as Paul did, " I keep 
under my body?" Do you bring 
the authority of an enlightened con- 
science to bear upon the kind and the 



8 Helps and Hinderances. 

quantity of food you eat, your hours 
of sleep, your habits of exercise, of 
amusement, of all bodily appetites? 
Do you rule your body, or does your 
body rule you ? Do you allow your- 
self articles of food and drink which 
please the palate and are considered 
harmless by others, in spite of your 
consciousness that they do not agree 
with you ? Do you allow your en- 
thusiasm for athletic sports to entice 
you to an expenditure of time and 
strength that you cannot afford, or 
the fascination of a story to rob you 
of needed sleep, or the luxury of a 
morning nap to steal from you your 
opportunity for reading and prayer? 
Have you expensive habits which 
tax more and more heavily the income 
of which you are only steward, and 
which lead you into doubtful and 
dangerous companionships ? Are you 
forming friendships whose influence 



Weights or Wings? 9 

is not to uplift, but rather to pull 
down, and are you venturing into 
temptation with blind confidence in 
your power to resist ? 

All these are solemn questions for 
the soul to ask and answer honestly, 
for there is but one easy way to run, 
and that is to lay aside every weight, 
be it a good or a bad thing, when it 
proves a hinderance. ''If thy right eye 
offend thee, pluck it out," said Christ, 
and surely an immortal soul need not 
hesitate at the casting away of such 
trivial things as those that hang upon 
us. It is because they are trivial that 
we do not give them any thought, or 
refuse to believe that they are real 
hinderances. We even venture upon 
more deadly risks and sport with ac- 
knowledged danger, confident in our 
purpose and ability not to go beyond 
retreat. It is the old story of Sam- 
son, childishly making a plaything of 



10 Helps and Hinderances. 

his enormous strength to perpetrate 
fierce jokes upon his enemies — the 
lesson of powers perverted, opportu- 
nity wasted, trust betrayed. The 
man knows there is danger, but it 
amuses him to experiment with it, to 
show that he is strong enough to defy 
it, and all the time, though he does 
not suspect it, his strength is going 
from him. By and by he ventures a 
little too far, and the Philistines have 
him, bound, blind, grinding in the 
mills of a bitter servitude. Samson s 
strength began to go from him long 
before Delilah cut his hair. He was 
paving the way for that betrayal when 
he wasted his powers in evil, and put 
his confidence simply in the bare ob- 
servance of his Nazarites vow, and 
not in the presence of the Lord God. 
Ruin began with what, in the light of 
his day and generation, seemed to 
him as small a transgression as does 



Weights or Wings? ii 

to you the indulgence in food or drink 
which you know clogs your digestion 
and clouds your intellect. 

You were not meant to creep but 
to soar. You are to mount up with 
wings as eagles, to run and not be 
weary, to walk and not faint. It is 
worth your while to strip for the race 
by throwing aside these hindering 
things, these weights of custom and 
habit and appetite, that your running 
may be like the swift course of the 
ostrich, carried on tireless feet, 
buoyed by strong wings. 



12 Helps and Hinderances? 



THE AMUSEMENT QUESTION. 




AM inclined to think that 
much which is said to young 
Christians upon this sub- 
ject of amusements is based, if not 
upon a false theory, at least upon the 
careless assumption that there is a 
class of amusements perfectly right 
and admissible for people who are 
not Christians, which become wrong 
w^hen one assumes Christian vows. 
We speak of them broadly as worldly 
pleasures, and the question in relation 
to them was recently put to me by an 
earnest young man, " Ought not a 
Christian to abstain entirely from 
worldly pleasures ? " 

What do we mean by worldly pleas- 
ures? Not sinful pleasures, surely, for 



The Amusement Question. 13 

then there could be no question ; but 
those forms of amusement which are 
indulged in by people who are not 
Christian. 

AN IMPORTANT DISTINCTION. 

Let us notice first that an amuse- 
ment is not necessarily sinful or harm- 
ful because it is enjoyed by worldly 
people. We share even with the 
beasts the satisfaction derived from 
food and sleep and shelter, and add 
to this satisfaction because of our 
higher nature an enjoyment of which 
they are not capable. To this enjoy- 
ment the Christian adds the further 
delight of recognizing in temporal 
benefits the kind provision of a Fa- 
thers hand, so that a form of pleasure 
which appeals to all, because of our 
organization as human beings, may 
give greater delight to those who see 
in it also the loving-kindness of God. 



14 Helps asb Hixderance^ 

When we- speak, therefore, of 
worldly pleasures let us remember 
that pleasant things are not necessa- 
rily wrongs ; that the self-denial which 
Christ enjoins upon us has nothing to 
do with acts of penance, but is the 
turning of the whole nature from self- 
seek ing and self-senice, and its vol- 
untar}* assumption of a new Master. 
All the real joy and pleasure of this 
life belong of right to the Christian. 
God gives us not only for our need, 
but "He giveth us all things richly to 
enjoy." The people who realize that 
the Creator of the universe is their 
Father, that they are his loving and 
obedient children, that he cares for 
their smallest interests, that he is a 
very present help in time of trouble, 
that ever)- event of their lives comes 
to them directly from his loving hand, 
and that, when this life is over, a 
home awaits them whose joys are 



The Amusement Question. 15 

eternal and beyond conception — 
surely they are the only people who 
can heartily enjoy the life that now is. 
The question is not, Shall the 
young Christians have pleasures and 
amusements ? but, What pleasures 
are helpful and health-giving, and 
what are injurious ? And in answering 
it I repeat the statement that all the 
real pleasure and joy of this life be- 
long to the Christian, and add this 
further proposition, " Whatever is 
right for any one to do is right for 
the Christian." 

THE WRONG ALWAYS INJURIOUS. 

If a thing is wrong it must be be- 
cause on the whole it is injurious 
either to yourself or others. That is 
the ground of all moral obligation. 
A thing is not wrong because dis- 
pleasing to God, but displeasing be- 
cause it is wrong, and wrong because 



i6 Helps and Hinderances. 

injurious. Gods supreme desire is 
the supreme good of his children, and 
things are pleasing or displeasing to 
him according as they do or do not 
tend toward this good. The obliga- 
tion to do nothing which will be in- 
jurious to yourself or others rests with 
equal force upon all. Laws are made 
for all, not for those who choose to 
admit their obligation. You would 
not admit it as an excuse for dis- 
obedience in a child that he said, '' I 
do not profess to be trying to please 
my father," or in a citizen that he de- 
clares, " I do not profess to be gov- 
erned by the laws of my country." A 
Christian is one who yields obedience 
to laws that are binding upon all 
mankind ; therefore, if a thing is wrong 
for a Christian it is wrong for every 
one, and the converse is equally true. 
The influence of wrong-doing on the 
part of the Christian is undoubtedly 



iHE Amusement Question. 17 

greater, since, to his violation of the 
great law by the specific act, he adds 
the power of his example in shaking the 
confidence of men in the sincerity of 
Christian profession, and in leading 
weaker ones astray who look to him 
as a safe guide; but there is nothing 
of which it may truthfully be said, '' It 
is wrong for you because you are a 
Christian, but right for me because I 
do not profess to be." This brings us 
down to the question, *' What pleas- 
ures and amusements are right, and 
what wrong 7 " — that is, " What on the 
whole are injurious to myself or to 
others through me, and then I shall 
know, not what is right for a Chris- 
tian, simply, but Avhat is right for any 
one." We are quite in the habit of 
stopping at this point and dismissing 
the subject by saying, '' O, well, that 
is a matter each one must decide for 
himself! It is purely an affair of 



1 8 Helps and Hixderanxes. 

individual judgment." Perhaps so, yet 
for the guidance of individual judg- 
ment certain great principles exist 
which must hold for everv one, cer- 
tain questions must be asked in every 
case. 

CERTAIN GREAT PRINCIPLES. 

I. God holds us responsible for our 
bodies as well as our souls. There is 
no warrant in the Bible for despising 
and misusing the wonderful mechan- 
ism whose creation was as much the 
work of divine skill as the breath of 
God which endowed it with a living 
soul to inspire and rule over it, and 
we owe the revisers of the Xew Tes- 
tament a debt of o:ratitude for havinor 
taken from its unauthorized place in 
the Authorized Version the phrase, 
" this vile body." Does any one im- 
agine that the apostle who said, 
" Know ye not, brethren, that your 



The Amusement Question. 19 

bodies are the temples of the Holy 
Ghost?" could ever have intended to 
speak of that temple as vile ? 

2. A sound, healthy body, including 
in its functions vigorous mental activ- 
ities, demands a varied round of oc- 
cupation, rest, and actual diversion. 
Especially is this the case with the 
young, and God has made provision 
for the need by giving them a keen 
relish for what are commonly called 
the pleasures of life in distinction 
from its work, just as he made provis- 
ion for the special need of food to re- 
pair the waste and carry on the rapid 
growth of the body by giving them 
keen appetites for food and capability 
for abundant sleep. When, therefore, 
I bring my pleasures to the bar of 
judgment, let me look at them from a 
purely physical view, and ask, " What 
is the effect of this particular form of 
amusement on my body ? Does it 



20 



Helps and Hixderanxes. 



bring needed rest and relaxation to 
overstrained muscles ? Does it sup- 
ply healthful exercise that invigorates 
and develops without harmful reac- 
tion ? Does it clear my brain, quicken 
my circulation, and feed my lungs 
with pure air, so that I can work bet- 
ter, sleep better, think better ? " So 
far it is a good thing. Does it bring 
me into a heated, impure atmosphere ? 
Does its fascination lead me to excess, 
that exhausts instead of recreates ? 
Does it trespass upon the hours of 
sleep so that my body is more severely 
taxed than by the work of the day ? 
Does the reaction from its excitement 
give me a sluggish brain and destroy 
my relish for the simple pleasures and 
common duties of life? Then it is 
unquestionably a bad thing. 

3. Let me consider my property. 
Does this amusement necessarily in- 
volve an outlay of money that is 



The Amusement Question. 21 

likely to go on increasing in amount? 
What returns, then, shall I get for my 
investment? Have I any right 
to spend upon what is simply an 
amusement that for which I am held 
to account as a steward ? Is this 
thing into w^hich I propose to put my 
money, week by week, and year by 
year, something that will make me 
any satisfactory return ? Can I afford 
to make so large an investment for so 
small profits ? 

4. Let me consider my time. 
What shall I have to show by and by 
as the result of the time I devote to 
this amusement ? Will it discipline 
and cultivate my mind, improve my 
taste, develop noble and heroic traits 
of character, enable me the better to 
appreciate honor and manhood, and 
inspire me with a keener hatred of 
vice and meanness ? Or shall I find 
that my moral sense is dulled, that 



22 Helps and Hinderances. 

vice becomes sometimes amusing 
rather than repulsive, and a growing 
appetite for excitement destroys my 
self-control? These are broad and 
general grounds, but it is exactly in 
this way that all fair judgment must 
be formed. Laws are not made for 
exceptional cases, but for the great 
aggregate of results. 

While amusements minister to a le- 
gitimate appetite of your nature you 
are not to forget that this is not 
the end of your life. You were not 
put into the world to be amused or 
to amuse yourself You are here to 
work; to lend a hand to all good; 
to build up character in yourself 
and in others, and when you have 
considered all the possible bearings 
of a question upon yourself you have 
still to consider it for others for whom, 
whether you choose or not, you are 
responsible. Take the illustration of 



The Amusement Question. 23 

the theater. Suppose you have 
proved to your own satisfaction that 
you can occasionally witness a good 
play without injury ; that by no means 
settles the question of duty. Is it 
not true that, on the whole, the the- 
ater as an institution is injurious to 
morals ? Is it not compelled to draw 
its attractions,' if not from absolute 
vice, at least from a border-land that 
lies very near to it? Is not the char- 
acter of the men and women who do 
its work such, as a class, that we are 
scarcely shocked at the grossest scan- 
dals in their private life, but regard 
them almost as a matter of course? 
This being the fact beyond dispute, 
can you afford by your money or 
your example to help sustain such an 
institution ? 

The same argument holds good 
again at card-playing. The card-party 
in the private parlor may be but a 



24 Helps and Hinderances. 

harmless evening diversion to the 
young lady who gives it, an innocent 
refuge for the emptiness and stupidity 
which cannot converse because it will 
not take the trouble to think, but to 
some of her guests be fatal food for 
a passion which grows to an insanity 
not second to the appetite for strong 
drink, and which its victim will grat- 
ify at any cost. The whole interest 
of a game of cards in the parlor or the 
saloon turns upon the chance involved, 
whether it be the mere delight of win- 
ning or the more substantial stake ; 
and what essential difference is there 
between playing for five dollars in a 
saloon and playing in a parlor for the 
prize bought with the five dollars? 
Do you say a difference in the de- 
moralizing surroundings ? But the 
passion acquired and encouraged in 
the one place has led many a young 
man to the other. Temptation that 



The Amusement Question. 25 

never finds the young woman in her 
sheltered life assails her brother and 
friend at every step, and many a fair 
young girl would quail in horror 
could she know the story of scores 
who have been drawn into the deadly 
snares of the gambling-den and the 
billiard-hall by an irresistible desire 
to gratify the skill first acquired in 
her society in a so-called Christian 
home. Is any mere amusement 
worth such a possible price 7 

I might add to the list the dance, 
and from a purely physical stand- 
point show you that, to the great 
majority of those who participate in 
it, it is a tax upon the vital forces 
which they cannot afford to meet, and 
is a direct temptation to the fatal ex- 
pedient of rousing by stimulation the 
exhausted body and weary brain. 

These things and others classed in 
society as amusements have no proper 



26 Helps and Hinderances. 

claim to the name ; they are in every 
sense dissipation, wasting body, brain, 
force of character, mental and moral 
power. God does not say of every 
transgression, "Thou shalt not." He 
leaves to you the work of judgment 
and reason ; and having given you 
the ability to decide, holds you re- 
sponsible for the decision, a responsi- 
bility which you cannot escape by 
pleading the usage of society, and al- 
lowing yourself to be carried help- 
lessly along by its force. 

But to the Christian is added the 
very highest motive for regarding the 
obligations so laid upon him, a desire 
for such a life as shall bring him into 
communion and fellowship with God. 
To all other questions he is bound to 
add, '' Does this form of amusement 
interfere with my spiritual growth } 
does it unfit me for prayer.^ does 
it weaken my desire for a higher 



The Amusement Question. 27 

spiritual life, and lead me away from 
God?" 

If it does, that ought to settle the 
question for me. Where I cannot go 
and feel that my Father is with me, 
there I will not go ; what I cannot do 
without hiding from my soul the clear 
shining of his face, that I will not do, 
but let me not dishonor him by count- 
ing him a hard master, or speaking of 
his service as if he were like the gods 
of the heathen, pleased with renunci- 
ation and sacrifice for their own sake. 
I have no doubt he looks with ap- 
proval upon the gladness and hearty 
merriment of youth as an earthly par- 
ent upon the sports of his children, 
even though to him their sports and 
amusements must seem trivial. He 
has filled the world with possibilities 
of rational pleasure for your sake, and 
wishes you to make use of them. 

Do not talk of giving up for his 



28 Helps and Hinderances; 

sake. " Giving up " implies a conflict 
of wills. Say rather giving— such a 
full, glad, complete surrender of your- 
self, soul, body, and spirit, that there 
can be no giving up, because no con- 
flict between you, but perfect harmony 
of desire, since your Father seeks 
only your good, and you seek only to 
know his wishes. You need not 
spend your life in a constant weighing 
of duties, and struggling against de- 
sires to disobey. This is a hard life — 
the life, not of a child, but a servant. 
Walk with your Father, and you will 
know you are in the right way ; if 
you have any doubts about his wishes, 
ask him ; he will tell you. But do 
not expect your whole nature to be 
changed so that you may have with 
the experience of youth the results 
of a life-time of discipline. Many a 
young Christian has been thrown 
into perplexity because he still found 



The Amusement Question. 29 

delight in the innocent pleasures of 
life, and entered with more zest into 
the merry conversation of his mates 
than into the lamentations of aged 
saints over the trials and mistakes of 
a life-time. '' Pray without ceasing, 
and in every thing give thanks.'' A 
heart that constantly turns heaven- 
ward for guidance, and utters its 
silent thanksgiving for every good, 
will not be seriously burdened by 
doubts, or oppressed by a sense of 
condemnation. 

Outside of the limits of positive 
wrong there is a region including 
those things of which Paul says wliile 
they are lawful they are not expedi- 
ent; they edify not; things of which 
we must ask not. What is the harm ? 
but. What is the good ? things whose 
tendency is simply doubtful, yet that 
doubt ought to settle the question 
for you. You do not wait to see it 



30 Helps and Hinderances. 

proved that food is tainted with poi- 
son — the possibility is enough to 
secure your avoidance. Again, a per- 
fectly innocent thing may, from per- 
sonal peculiarity or special circum- 
stance, become for you injurious and 
therefore wrong. The spectacle of a 
rational human being who has entered 
upon an endless existence questioning 
and hesitating over abandoning any 
thing so trivial as a mere form of 
amusement is one over which men 
and angels might well weep. May no 
young Christian ever consent to stand 
in so humiliating a position. 

My heart fills with gladness as I 
think of the army of youth, with its 
eager impulses, its glowing enthusi- 
asm, its strength, its vigor, its courage, 
its hopefulness, enlisted under a 
Leader whose divine power and wis- 
dom are pledged to bring it to victory. 

The army of endeavor, not of en- 



The Amusement Question. 31 

durance ; whose soldiers have clasped 
hands in a holy league around the 
standard of the Lord Christ, vowing 
loyalty to his service, and promising 
to look up and lift up in his name. 
Not a helpless, moaning, half-hearted 
host to be carried in ambulances 
through the enemy's country under 
watch and guard and patrol, but a 
fighting army ; a triumphant army, 
going forth conquering and to con- 
quer on its way to the country that is 
not far off. 

Looking to the things that are be- 
fore ; seeking the things that are 
above ; lending to every good cause a 
helping hand. I repeat to you the 
instructions that centuries ago were 
spoken by the Master s lips : 

*' Let your loins be girt about, and 
your lamps burning, and you your- 
selves like men that wait for their 
Lord.'' 



32 



Helps and Hinderances. 



LEADING IN PRAYER. 




|0W many young Christians 
shrink from going to a 
prayer-meeting, or sit quak- 
ing through the services, unable to 
gather for themselves help and inspira- 
tion from the experience and exhor- 
tation of others simply because of 
the possibility that in some pause 

the leader may say, '' Brother A , 

will you lead us in prayer ? " 

He would not think of refusinor, I 
do not remember ever to have heard 
one decline to pray when thus called 
upon, though I have often wondered 
why the leader of a meeting who 
would not feel at liberty to say, 

*' Brother A , will you make a few 

remarks ? " should, without hesitation, 



Leading in Prayer. 33 

request him to present the petitions 
of the assembly to God. But though 
he does not refuse, his tongue cleaves 
to the roof of his mouth ; his ideas 
float away ; he seems to be in the 
center of a vast empty space ; his own 
voice sounds to him strange and un- 
natural ; he might offer a despairing 
petition for himself, like Paul, crying 
out as he began to sink, but he is ut- 
terly incapable of " leading in prayer." 
For one does not lead unless others 
follow, and he feels that he should 
gather up the fears and desires, the 
thanksgivings, confessions, repentings, 
and promisings of the hearts bowed 
with him, and present them as one be- 
fore the mercy-seat so that the things 
asked for may be the united desire of 
the whole company of believers. 

It is this attempt at praying for 
others which bewilders and over- 
whelms the young Christian. He 
3 



34 Helps and Hinderances. 

forgets that he has only to go forward 
himself, and the others will follow ; to 
present his own petition, and let it 
draw the hearts of others after it We 
who kneel together are a body of sup- 
pliants having common needs, coming 
to a Father to whom w^e are under 
common obligations, to claim com- 
mon promises. We are all sinners 
saved by grace ; we all have occasion 
for thanksgiving and for confession ; 
w^e all have need of divine help. If 
with simplicity and directness you 
come to God for yourself, you are 
certain to carry w^ith you the desires 
of all the others. Therefore the sur- 
est way for a young Christian to lead 
in prayer is to forget all about lead- 
ing, and pray simply for his own case. 
Can he do this.^ He can learn. Prayer 
may be, as the poet says, " the Chris- 
tian s vital breath,'' but there is a great 
deal to be learned about breathing. 



Leading in Prayer. 35 

Accustom yourself to pray aloud at 
your private devotions. The sound of 
your own voice bewilders you because 
you are not accustomed to it. A 
great deal that we call private prayer 
is only a nebulous, wandering sort of 
thought, and the habit of praying 
aloud helps greatly to fix the mind 
upon the petition, and gives clearness 
and directness of expression. 

Make preparation. Why not con- 
sider as well what I am to say to God, 
as what I am to say to men, espe- 
cially when I am to take upon myself 
to come to the King as an embassa- 
dor for others ? What do I need to 
make this meeting of profit to me ? 
A sense of Gods actual presence. 
Faith in his willingness to bless. 
Trust in his love and wisdom. Power 
to commit myself to his direction. A 
sincere, teachable spirit to receive the 
truth. Wisdom to impart it to others. 



36 Helps and Hinderanxes. 

All this I am to receive through the 
direct influence of the Holy Spirit in 
my heart. The presence and influ- 
ence of that Spirit I am therefore to 
ask and expect, but I have no right 
so to rely upon the promise that he 
will indite my petitions for me as to 
kneel at the throne with no definite 
idea of any wants at all. 

Be deliberate. Why is it that peo- 
ple who in speaking take time to 
keep their thought in view, feel that 
in prayer they must rush on without 
pause, and pour out a flood of mean- 
ingless expressions, or begin a sen- 
tence with no thought of its ending.'^ 
A slow, quiet manner of speech car- 
ries not only your own soul with the 
petition, but the souls of others. It 
is as if the longing went before, and 
the speech only presented it to God. 

Be direct. Eloquent sentences and 
roundabout phrases are wholly out of 



i 



Leading in Prayer. 37 

place in prayer. Such introductions 
as, '' O thou high and holy God, eter- 
nal, immortal, invisible, before whom 
the heavens are unclean, and archan- 
gels veil their faces ; who dwellest in 
light unapproachable, glorious in maj- 
esty, fearful in praises " — such an in- 
vocation may be appropriate to cer- 
tain occasions, for an enraptured 
singer reciting the splendors of the 
Most High, but it is to our Father 
that we come in prayer, and the sim- 
plicity of Christ's own address is the 
safest for young people to follow. 
Ask for what you want as simply and 
directly as you would bring a request 
to an earthly friend. When one 
prays, " Our Father, we feel that we 
need to love thee more, that we may 
serve thee better. Give us more love 
to thee, that with our whole hearts we 
may desire to do thy will," every one 
who listens goes with him heartily, 



3 J Helps and Hixderanxes. 

word by word. But if he begins, *' O 
Lord, w^e who are encumbered by 
mortahty, and environed by hinder- 
ances, over whose spiritual aspirations 
hang ever the clouds of human limi- 
tation," etc., his fellow suppliants may 
stumble after him closely enough to 
bring up haltingly at the end, but the 
chances are that most of them will fall 
out by the way. 

Finally let me add two " do nots." 
Do not attempt to convey information 
to the Lord concerning your church 
and society affairs. " Thou knowest 
that I love thee " is all very well, but 
not " Thou knowest how we have 
been holding these meetings, and how 
little interest there is in them, and 
how indifferent the people are, and 
how hard it is to awaken them," etc. 
Beware of " Thou knowest ; " it is too 
often a weapon cast at men, and not a 
petition to God. 



Leading in Prayer. 39 

Do not attempt to pray for every 
good cause on every occasion. I have 
been in meetings where prayer was 
asked for some special case, and heard 
in response only stock prayers touch- 
ing the Jews, the heathen, the sick, 
and every thing else within the range 
of prayer, with scarcely a word touch- 
ing directly the case presented. This 
meeting, these souls, this portion of 
God's word, this possible experience, 
should be kept definitely before the 
mind as a subject for united prayer. 

The story has often been told of 
the soldier who defended himself from 
the charge of holding secret commu- 
nication with the enemy by declaring 
that he went into the forest to pray, 
and that it was God to whom he had 
been heard speaking. 

" Speak to him now, then," said his 
general. " You never had greater need, 
for you have only five minutes to live." 



40 Helps and Hinderances. 

The soldier dropped upon his 
knees and poured forth such a prayer 
of faith and trust, committing himself 
so confidently to the tender mercies 
of his God and Saviour, that every 
heart was touched. " Let him go," said 
the general. " No man can acquit him- 
self creditably on parade who has not 
been accustomed to private drill." 

So to the young Christian as to the 
older one comes the apostle's exhor- 
tation, '' Pray without ceasing." Cul- 
tivate a spirit of prayer ; pray much 
in secret; live in such an atmosphere 
of prayer that its audible expression 
will be as natural as your breath, 
and, going thus to God, you must 
needs lead after you those who listen. 



Speaking to Edification. 41 



SPEAKING TO EDIFICATION. 




lUT of twenty people who 
may speak at an average 
social meeting probably fif- 
teen will do it more or less under 
compulsion. They feel that they 
are expected to speak, that the pas- 
tor depends upon them, and that in 
some measure they are responsible 
for the meetings; and though they 
have nothing urgent upon their minds 
that seems to be a message given 
them to deliver, or a testimony to the 
grace of God toward them, they speak, 
and feel that they have discharged a 
duty. Or they think that they ought 
to speak ; why, they cannot exactly 
say, except as a sort of penance that 
they believe must have some merit 



42 Helps and Hinderances. 

because they find it so hard. They 
call it " taking up the cross;" the 
moment they sit down in the meeting 
conscience begins holding it up to 
them, and thev shrink and tremble 
and hold back, and say, " Til speak 
next," and go on delaying and trying 
to think of something to say, until at 
last they start desperately up, get 
through a few set phrases, and sit 
down with a sigh of relief 

Common sense says. This ought 
not so to be ; it ought to be a delight 
to testify to the loving-kindness of 
our common Lord ; you are not afraid 
of these people; you do not fear un- 
kindly criticism ; what is the matter 
with you or with the meetings? Is 
not the troubleusually that you really 
have nothing to say? If these same 
people were met together to discuss 
the best methods for carrying on a 
festival or a sociable, or the arrange- 



Speaking to Edification. 43 

ments for a picnic, they would be 
lively and unembarrassed and posi- 
tive in their opinions. Christian liv- 
ing has not taken such a practical 
place in their thought that they have 
any definite opinion about it or are 
eager for helpful information. 

You forget the meaning of edifica- 
tion; it is literally "a building up/' 
and the purpose of this social meeting 
is that by the words spoken there 
men shall be edified ; and if your sim- 
ple repetition of a passage of Script- 
ure, your declaration of a continued 
purpose to serve God, or your testi- 
mony to his preserving grace, strength- 
ens your own courage, is helpful to 
you, then you have spoken to edifica- 
tion. But if you would talk as you 
do in a business meeting you would 
soon advance beyond this. Why 
should you not get up and say with- 
out any embarrassment, " I wish I 



44 Helps and Hinderances. 

knew of some way to keep my 
thoughts from wandering when other 
people pray, so that I could join 
heartily with them. I can pray my- 
self, or I can follow one or two peti- 
tions ; but then I find myself thinking 
of something else." Or, *' The thing 
that is hardest for me to do is to 
speak to other people about being 
Christians. I don't seem to know 
what to say or how to begin.'' Or, 
'' I don't think I really enjoy the 
Bible as many people seem to. I 
read it, and I believe it is Gods 
word ; but it does not come right 
home to my heart as if it meant me, 
and sometimes I'm not very much in- 
terested in it, as I am in other books." 
Or, " I should like to feel when I pray 
as many Christians say they do, as if 
they were actually talking to God, 
and have just as real a sense of his 
hearing my words as I have that my 



Speaking '^6 Edification. 45 

friends right before me are hearing 
them this minute. And I should like 
to have a response that would seem 
as real to me as if one of you should 
get up and speak to me. People talk 
of such a feeling, but I don't under- 
stand it ; I believe God is here ; I 
believe he hears me, but I don't feel 

Now, some such words as these 
would express the actual experience 
which a very large number have 
brought with them to prayer-meeting ; 
but they keep it to themselves from a 
feeling that it is not the experience they 
ought to have, and that it would be 
the reverse of edifying to confess it, 
when in fact they would stand a 
chance of getting some light upon 
their difficulties, as well as a chance 
of drawing from some discouraged 
soul the surprising admission, ''Why, 
other people have the same troubles 



46 Helps and Hinderances. 

that I do ; so perhaps I need not be 
entirely disheartened, after all." 

The adversary himself must have 
invented the custom of standing up to 
speak in social meetings where the 
numbers are not large, and if I were 
a minister I would do my best to 
abolish it and to induce my people to 
sit in some fashion other than in stiff 
rows, and I would try to induce them 
to converse together instead of mak- 
ing speeches. Every regular meeting 
should have a topic, announced before- 
hand ;.but more important still, every 
Christian should and may have a 
topic for the day or for the week, so 
that his reading and thought and 
prayer are to some definite point, and 
then he will seldom be at a loss for a 
clear, practical idea on the subject 
that is before him. 

A young Christian upon whose 
heart the mere reading of a chapter 



Speaking to Edification. 47 

makes little impression will find the 
Scriptures a very different thing if he 
goes to it as he would to a scientific 
text-book ; first, to find what the au- 
thor says, then what he means by it. 

" What has God said about prayer ? " 
will set him to searching his book ; 
** What does he mean by it ? '' to med- 
itating, to studying, to asking for 
light. 

When the process of edifying or 
building up is going on in your life, 
you will have something to tell or 
something to ask, if you will be con- 
tent to be simple, natural, and ear- 
nest, and to talk from the experience 
you have, not from what you fancy 
you ought to have. 



43 Helps and Hinderances? 



GROWTH IN GRACE. 




HE Bible every-where as- 
sumes that Christians are 
to grow ; that the divine 
Hfe implanted within them is to go 
on increasing in brightness like the 
light of the morning; imparting its 
vivifying power like the leaves; push- 
ing steadily upward from the germ 
through successive stages of leaf, 
flower, and fruit like the living plant. 
A Christianity that is not progressive, 
that is not advancing from its best to- 
day toward a better to-morrow, is not 
the Christianity which Paul urged 
upon the saints at Corinth and Eph- 
esus and Philippi. This form of 
growth comes necessarily from the 
very nature of that which is implanted ; 



Growth in Grace. 49 

all that the Christian has to do is to 
fulfill the conditions of ofrowth. If the 
plant has light and warmth and nour- 
ishment it must grow ; if the Chris- 
tian keeps in the light, if he feeds 
upon the word, if his heart is open 
to divine influences that, like dew and 
sunshine and refreshing showers, are 
always falling upon the soul that does 
not shut itself away from them, he 
will grow ; he must grow. 

He is only the branch, and needs 
but to maintain his vital union with 
the vine, and the sap will cause his 
growth. His growth is for fruit-bear- 
ing ; and the divine energy which 
pervades every smallest branch while 
it is united to the vine, will produce 
fruit at the right time if it is not hin- 
dered. 

Then there is another figure by 
which spiritual progress is frequently 
illustrated, and that is the growth of 



50 Helps and Hinderances. 

the child. The Christian is born into 
a new life with undeveloped powers, 
and with neither strength nor wisdom 
of his own. To the unconscious 
growth of the plant is added the ele- 
ment of personality ; and Christians 
are exhorted as new-born babes to 
desire the sincere milk of the word, 
that they may grow thereby to feed 
upon the living bread, and, passing on 
through the stage of childhood and 
childish things, to grow up into man- 
hood whose measure shall be the 
stature of the fullness of Christ. The 
child eats and sleeps and exercises, 
and is "under tutors and governors;" 
and his growth and development 
takes care of itself So this spiritual 
babe, resting without anxiety in the 
arms that hold him and the love that 
cares for him, yielding himself without 
argument to the wisdom that directs 
him, feeding upon the word, living 



Growth in Grace. 51' 

In the light, keeping close to his pro- 
tector, exercising his new-found pow- 
ers, is in the way of healthy spiritual 
growth that is as certain as the growth 
of the child. 

One further figure is that of the 
building. The Christian is to grow 
as the temple grows ; first the solid 
foundation already laid for him — the 
rock Christ Jesus; then upon that he 
is to add, stone by stone, manliness, 
knowledge, temperance, patience, and 
all solid virtues that make up a godly 
character. The exhortation to ener- 
getic, painstaking work does not clash 
with the idea of growth by indwelling 
divine energy. Peter's *' Giving all 
diligence, add to your faith virtue," 
supplements Pauls ** Ye are God's 
building.'' 

These same stones with which the 
Christian builds are elsewhere called 
fruits of the Spirit; the grace spring- 



52 Helps and Hinderances. 

ing from the divine germ, and nour- 
ished by the divine power must be 
used by the Christian before it be- 
comes an element of character. One 
has regard to the abiUty to do ; the 
other to the result of doing. 

All growth comes through personal 
knowledge of Christ. " Grow in grace, 
and in the knowledge of our Lord 
and Saviour Jesus Christ." " Grace 
and peace be multiplied unto you 
through the knowledge of God, and 
of Jesus our Lord," and so on through 
the whole New Testament. We are 
to grow by him ; we are to grow up 
into him ; the fruit which we are 
exhorted to bear is not only for him, 
but from him, and can be made sure 
only by abiding in vital union with 
him, that we may be in sympathy 
with his purposes and desires. " Let 
this mind be in you which was also 
in Christ Jesus. 



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